1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to apparatus and methods for use in dermatological screening, monitoring, documentation, and diagnosis of skin conditions, and more particularly to a portable hand-held medical imaging apparatus for documenting areas and subjects of interest on a patient's skin.
2. Description of Related Art
Accurately identifying skin lesions and their causes and clearly documenting this information increases diagnostic accuracy for improved treatment and healing. Such documentation should include information identifying the area of interest, and physical characteristics of the lesion, including the size, shape, configuration, color, and color of the surrounding skin. During a dermatological examination, a physician will typically conduct a visual inspection of the patient's entire body, including the scalp, hands, and feet, looking for suspicious growths, moles, or lesions. Monitoring and documentation of skin lesions, suspicious growths, and moles, is critical in diagnosis and treatment of dermatological disorders. In addition, advancements in medical records technology now present a need for an imaging system capable of capturing and downloading images, and associated data, relating to skin lesions, suspicious growths, and moles, to current Electronic Health Records (EHRs) so as to enable efficient data capture and tracking of the patient's progression and/or resolution of skin abnormalities.
One method commonly employed in the dermatology field to monitor patient lesions involves holding a measuring apparatus, such as a wound care template or ruler, against the skin and photographing the area using a conventional digital camera. Often, however, photographic images captured using this method are captured from different distances, angles, under different lighting conditions, and often times lack proper focus. In addition, the physician must rely exclusively on the wound care template or ruler to determine the size of the lesion or AOI.
As a result, the background art reveals various apparatus and methods for examining skin tissue and lesions. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,170,987, issued to Anselmo et al., discloses a skin diagnosis system that includes a scanning and optical arrangement wherein light is reflected from the skin to three separate light filters. U.S. Pat. No. 4,693,255, issued to Beall, discloses a system that relies on computerized analysis of a video recording of the kinetics of the change in appearance of the traumatized skin site. U.S. Pat. No. 4,905,702 issued to Foss, discloses an apparatus for imaging and measuring portions of the skin. U.S. Pat. No. 5,836,877, issued to Zavislan, discloses a system for facilitating pathological examination of a lesion in tissue using a computer system having a camera for producing a digital macroscopic picture of the lesion and an imaging apparatus coupled to the computer system. U.S. Pat. No. 6,215,893, issued to Leshem et al., discloses an apparatus and method for temporal comparison of skin surface images using a CCD camera adapted with telecentric optics that enable the capture of images with constant magnification independent of the camera-object distance. U.S. Pat. No. 6,603,552, issued to Cline el al., discloses a lightweight hand-held skin abnormality detection system that includes a fluorescent light source and a beam splitter which divides reference light and fluorescent light into separate optical channels, each of which produces a an image. U.S. Pat. No. 7,657,101, issued to Christiansen II discloses a device for acquiring first and subsequent images of a suspect area on a patient and methods for monitoring or detecting changes in the suspect area.
The disclosures of the background art, however, are burdened with overly complex systems and other limitations that have resulted in less than widespread commercial success and acceptance.